Math Awards Continue to Multiply at HFCA

William Thurston, noted professor of mathematics and computer science at Cornell University contends, "Mathematics is not about numbers, equations, computations or algorithms: it is about understanding."

As the first middle school in Illinois to become STEM certified, Holy Family Catholic Academy (Inverness) agrees with Professor Thurston and is committed to building math literacy in its over 500 students from preschool through grade 8. "We develop math literacy by moving from memorizing and calculating to understanding and thinking like a mathematician," explains Principal Kate O'Brien. Math literacy includes reading and writing skills--not only writing down the steps of a problem, but learning how to critically read math problems and using words to describe a problem solving process.

The Academy's math curriculum is complemented by its instructional framework that focuses on differentiated learning and collaboration. This approach was validated by Cognia, a global not-for-profit educational accreditation and certification organization (formerly known as AdvancED) during HFCA's STEM accreditation. Their report stated, "HFCA's method of math placement is a wonderful example of how learners are grouped by ability, not age or grade level. The school provides multiple levels of math for middle school learners which range from pre-algebra support to honors geometry."

Recently, HFCA's middle school students participated in a math competition at Regina Dominican High School. The competition included team and individual portions that focused on problem-solving, algebra and geometry.

"Regina, an all girls high school, requested that girls make up at least 40% of our team members. While often girls are under-represented in math, 60% of our HFCA math team was girls," explained Math teacher, Ms. Christina Calgano.

Likewise, the teams included diversity in age with 6th and 7th graders named team captains. Sixth grader, Brendan Kellar's team won 2nd place overall.

"At first I was a little nervous being the team captain, but at HFCA, we work in teams a lot and everyone learns leadership skills."

Ruby Arun, 7th grade, won 1st place in the individual category: "I liked the team portion of the competition the best. We collaborate during our classes and all work well together. It was a great feeling to be respected by kids that are older than me."

Mrs. Mary Stenson, Regina Dominican Math Teacher congratulated the HFCA team, "Holy Family Catholic Academy's teams were very talented and competitive; we were thrilled to host them."

Ms. Kate McCully, HFCA Math teacher, shared that more competitions are scheduled and explained, "Building math literacy translates into building problem solving confidence. Our goal is to prepare competent and confident students for high school and beyond and being part of a larger community of math students helps us reach that goal."